Marking 180 mock papers….can’t cope

[Supermummy88]

Good everyone.

I’ve been teaching for over 10 years and had a career break for 2 years whilst my children were young and not in full time school. I was doing supply a few days a week. However, I’ve now gone back into work full time and taken the role as head of geography. I started in October. I have 3 year 11 classes, 2 year 10 classes, 2 year 9 classes, 1 year 8 and 1 year 7.

The year 11’s had their mocks in december and I marked both paper 1 and paper 2. Both papers were about 20 pages long each…120 papers in total! I really struggled to mark them all. I have 2 young children of my own and I felt they really struggled as I spent no time with them at all.

Year 11 now have mocks again in February and I will have to mark again, however this time I will also have to mark paper 3. I know deep down I won’t be able to cope…especially because of the work load I already have. I’m now thinking that I perhaps should have just stuck to supply teaching. It took me about 40 minutes to mark each paper as there are many extended questions.

What are your thoughts on this? In previous schools I’ve only ever had one year 11 class so the mock marking wasn’t as intense.

Thank you

Which she will spend marking!

@Supermummy88
It might have been said already, but just do paper 3 for the next mock. Your HoD so you should be able to decide this.
They've already done a 1 and 2, no need to repeat these.
Then for more exam practice do small chunks in lessons then students self mark.
And going forward, set one paper per mock session. Pick and choose questions to make marking as straight forward as it can be.

Tell the head you simply won't be doing it - they can either cancel the mocks or they can provide another solution

not marking mocks isn’t a solution and neither is cancelling mocks. Imagine the indignation on here if a school did either of those things!

OP, your other geography teacher needs to help you mark. If he can’t follow a markscheme then what is going on? Some moderation between the two of you would help iron out any issues. Agree with him how he will record marks on the paper so you don’t spend hours looking for them….

Please speak to your line manager. I work across subjects and across key stages (I work in an all through school). There is much support to ensure that my running around like a nutter across the school is supported by reducing my exam commitments. But I only got this by speaking up about it and the stress it was placing me under.

She already has plans for the Easter break, and why not..

Half term is a month away. Should every person put up with crazy workloads as they have holidays to look forward to?

We would not be allowed to let children mark them either. I wouldn’t anyway, the mark schemes are hard enough for a professional to decipher never mind a child. It is madness that SLT decide what the students sit without factoring in staff workload. HODs decide in my school for that very reason.

So 180 papers, I think you said each took 40 minutes to mark, that's 120 hours of marking.

It's just ridiculous. Go back to supply. I've worked as a supply teacher for 15 years now.

If your school insists on students sitting two full sets of mocks two months apart - for which there is zero pedagogical basis, in my view, but if that's the SLT decision, there's probably not much you can do about it - you need to train up your colleague now to enable them to share the marking with you.

It's not sustainable to have a two person department in which only one teacher is teaching GCSE. Your colleague IS qualified to teach GCSE, as they have a secondary PGCE. They just haven't got the experience yet. It's your job as HoD to train them.

Sit with them while you mark a paper together, then get them to mark one independently which you then moderate. They are capable of reading a mark scheme and understanding what a good answer looks like. Do this process with 5 or 6 papers until your colleague feels confident to go it alone. You can then give them half of the papers to mark. It's good CPD for them and will equip them to take over some of the GCSE classes next year. You can't keep going with a department that only has one teacher who can teach years 10 and 11. That's just poor management and it's your job to ensure your colleague can teach his subject effectively to all year groups.

If your school will pay for it, I also suggest you get your colleague on a training course run by the exam board ASAP.

Don't assume colleague is qualified. I taught KS3 Geography for years despite not doing it at GCSE.

The other teacher can do it

Talk to the subject leaders of other essay-based subjects. If they are feeling the same strains, you can all lobby together for a more sensible workload. Bring it up at the next union meeting. Tell your line manager it's not possible.
I agree you should train up the other teacher, but that probably seems like even more work in the short term. Right now, you need to make it clear the marking load needs reducing.
(Teacher of 30 years, and HoD English)

Fucking hell

I used to teach multiple GCSE Classes. I always preferred to mark Question by Question, so I didn't have to keep referring back to the paper and mark scheme.

40 minutes does seem an unusually long time to mark 1 paper. Are you writing feedback on each paper or just marking? I used to only give a mark and then spend a lesson going over the exam paper, focusing on common mistakes for each Q.

Quite, when I worked in the school office I would perform this task. Such a waste of a teacher's time.

I would agree with this. You have to mark smart when you're doing mocks. Do each question separately and don't write any feedback at all. There's no need. You can give generic feedback in class. They all make the same bloody mistakes!

I'm an English teacher and I can mark a whole GCSE paper in 5 minutes flat. I've honed my skills over time!

I will have 180 English papers - six hours worth. The only way is to make a top sheet with the marks on and the targets for each section so all you do is write marks on and highlight targets. No need for one paper to take 40mins. Write nothing in the papers and get students to set their own targets from the highlighted areas. The other teacher needs to mark some too.

Can you not offer homework to all 9 classes you teach until the papers are marked.
Assume you have free periods during some days to mark what would have been homework so use this time to do the mocks.

Why two mocks anyway. Our school do end of year exams for all years and mocks for yrs 11 and 13 before ( occasionally some after ) Christmas.

No idea how many classes you have each week, or meetings, or tutor time but it seems you either give some for someone else to mark or cut down on your workload.

I have to say I disagree - the other teacher should not do the marking of the mocks.
Either it's a reasonable task, and you need to do it , or it's not a reasonable task and the answer isn't to pass it on to someone else.

And perhaps it shouldn’t be ‘one of those things’.

Why in response to a clearly heavy workload choose to suggest that they aren’t up to the task of being in the profession? Where is the solidarity or support?

Just because you have historically had to struggle and make it work does not mean everyone else in the profession has to. If they suggest that it is madness, perhaps consider greeting that with reflection and realising that perhaps you have also struggled and it isn’t right to have been put in that position instead of suggesting that they’re not cut out to be a teacher.

OP, send your colleague on a CPD marking course and in the meantime moderate some with them and divvy up the marking. Mark in class what can be marked as it will be helpful for your cohorts to understand the full process and what is required.

You shouldn’t have to struggle and choose between this and your family.

good luck

It’s not reasonable to only have one teacher who can mark GCSE so this becomes part of their professional development and covered in dept meeting time.

Yes, I said that upthread. Although they'll have to be trained and standardised.

I agree that it would be totally reasonable to ask for some help. That might be:

• only do one/two papers rather than all three
• a couple of days off timetable
• geography timetabled first, and you being kept free for all the year 11 lessons you would have had during the exams, so you can crack on then
• delegating the easier sections to your colleague (possibly in return for doing some of their marking when it gets to KS3 exams, as they presumably have multiple groups there)
• SLT supporting you by taking on the easier sections (I don't suppose there's a geographer amongst them?)
• longer to mark them (preferably with it made clear to pupils and parents that the delay is not your fault)
• buy in some external help, if they know any retired geography teachers.

You also need to get your colleague trained up to teach GCSE, so that the load can be spread more evenly. Make sure that is timetabled, and training is on the agenda for when year 11 go on study leave. Helping with the marking could be a useful first step.

Thats tough! So, looking at the work load; if I’m not mistaken it’s a 180 papers taking say 40 minutes a paper to mark? A total of 120 hours? Or 3 weeks of full time work?

Just giving advice on an individual basis not a commentary on a profession generally.

If you don’t like it do something else.

A GCSE paper should take no more than 5 minutes to mark for an experienced teacher.